Yesterday, I received a letter in the mail congratulating me on my new BCC (Board Certified Coach) credential from CCE (Center for Credentialing and Education).

 

It was nice to get, but no surprise.

CCE, a non-profit which has been certifying a variety of counselors for years, recently stepped into the realm of business, executive and life coach certification, with this impressive-sounding new credential. But any executive, business or life coach who was previously certified by the ICF or IAC and who could demonstrate that they already have coach-specific training, got grandfathered into the BCC for $100. The only catch was that we had to take a norming exam to help CCE establish appropriate exam questions for future coaches who test for the BCC.

Even though I have reservations about the new BCC life coach certification, I decided to take the plunge and get it for the following reasons:

• Life coach certifications from independent certifiers are generally the most respected in coaching, because with no regulation, some coach training schools (at least the ones that are disreputable) sometimes have very low coach certification requirements (or no requirements other than a fee). 
• I think competition between independent certifiers is good for coaches, their clients and the coaching industry, because it forces the certifiers to listen to us and upgrade their services in order to stay relevant. So a new independent coach certifier may be positive for the profession.
• At this stage of the game, no single life coach certification organization is the recognized leader, worldwide. The ICF claims this distinction, but most coaches do not agree, especially in fast-growth markets, like Asia. So it may be a good idea to be certified by more than one independent coach certification organization.

That said, I have plenty of reservations about the new Board Certified Coach credential and may not use 'BCC' after my name in most situations - at least not yet. Here's why:

1. As one of my colleagues, who is certified by both the IAC and ICF, recently commented, a certification from an organization that mainly certifies counselors may further confuse the public about the difference between coaching, therapy and counseling. Appearances to the contrary, business and life coaching are completely different from either counseling or psychotherapy. Coaching is based on different paradigms and does not target clients who are mentally ill or in crisis. A decade or so ago, when I became a coach, the profession of coaching was under attack by psychology professionals, who claimed we were practicing therapy without a license. Then a landmark lawsuit in the state of Colorado established life coaching as a separate profession from psychotherapy.  Furthermore, the reason coaching is still not legally regulated anywhere is because coaches don't work with vulnerable populations. Since that landmark case, therapists and counselors have jumped on the coaching bandwagon in large numbers, because they aren't hamstrung by regulations, they've seen how effective coaching can be and because they can charge more for it. As another coaching colleague commented: The confusion between coaching and therapy isn't because coaches are practicing bad therapy; it's because too many therapists are practicing bad coaching. One of the reasons I decided to get the BCC anyway, is so I can watch from the inside how CCE's influence plays out and can speak up as needed. If CCE does its job well, it could actually cut down on the confusion and erroneous assumptions that counselors and therapists sometimes make when they hang out their coaching shingles.
2. CCE bases the BCC credential solely on college degrees, coach-specific training and passage of a multiple-choice test. Reputable life coach certifications always require demonstration of coaching skills. Why? Because unlike virtually any other profession, including counseling and psychotherapy, efficacy in business and life coaching is not based on expert knowledge, but on the skill of assisting coaching clients to leverage their own knowledge, thoughts, actions, gifts, etc. In other words, coaching is a skill set, not a knowledge base. A degree has little or nothing to do with competency in coaching. Coach training is a very good thing, but doesn't automatically ensure a skilled coach.  And multiple-choice tests measure knowledge, not coaching skills. To get my stamp of approval, CCE needs to add an oral test to their certification requirements.
3. CCE claims its multiple-choice test is the first scientifically-based measurement of coaching knowledge, but is it really? The 'science' is based on the answers to test questions that coaches who are certified by the 'less scientific' IAC and ICF gave on BCC norming tests. In other words, it's piggy-backing on knowledge collected by thousands of non-science-based coaches and calling that scientific. In any case, one of the reasons coaching has rocketed to the forefront of human development is because coaches have been free to mix findings from neuroscience and positive psychology with ancient wisdom traditions, plus their own insights and intuition, to create new approaches to human growth. Science is good, but results are what matter.
4. CCE claims to be the first certifier of coaches that is itself 'accredited'. That's good, but it may not mean what you think. Usually, when we talk of accreditation in education, what we're referring to is the 'gold standard' in accreditation, which in the United States (which influences education around the world), means that your educational institution is accredited by a not-for-profit regional accrediting agency that is in turn, approved by the U.S. Department of Education. CCE is not accredited by such an agency. I tried to trace its accreditation back to the USDE, but only got as far back as an agency that accredits engineers (not exactly related to coaching). To my knowledge, no independent coach certifier, nor educator of coaches, possesses the gold standard in accreditation. That doesn't mean they aren't good, it just means they don't have the ultimate stamp of approval in education. (Beware though, of phony 'associations' that are invented by un-scrupulous 'coaching schools' or more-aptly, certification mills, just so they can claim to be 'accredited' by somebody.) CCE's accreditation doesn't make it a better source of life coach certification. In fact, they may not understand the profession of coaching as well as either the ICF or IAC.
5. There has been some suggestion (unconfirmed) that the CCE may require its Board Certified Coaches to administer a psychological profile that measures the mental health of new coaching clients, in order to refer them out to psychotherapists. This would be no more appropriate than requiring Certified Financial Planners to test the mental health of their clients (after all, behavioral economics is the latest hot specialty for therapists), or requiring bartenders to test their customers for alcoholism (shouldn't some of those barflies be in rehab?). I know many psychologists believe 90 - 100% of all people are at least neurotic and could benefit from therapy, but coaches aren't in the mental health business, are untrained in the area of diagnosis and in many locations it would actually be illegal for an untrained professional to try to diagnose a mental illness. What coaches are responsible for is helping their clients reach the clients' desired results. If coaching isn't effective in reaching those results and the coach suspects psychotherapy could help, they can best serve their clients by sharing that observation and declining to waste the clients' money by continuing the coaching. But coaches testing for psychopathology? That won't serve coaching clients (but might serve counselors and therapists), because the real test of whether coaching will 'work' for a client is not the client's diagnosis, but whether the client is ready to take full responsibility for their own life. If it comes between keeping my BCC or succumbing to a requirement to administer  psychological tests, I may give up the credential and I'm sure I'm not alone. But I am so far taking a 'wait and see' attitude towards this.
6. CCE's ethical standards for BCCs are more appropriate for counselors and therapists than for life coaches. That's not automatically bad, but suggests that CCE itself, is confused about the differences between counseling and coaching. Here are SCM's ethical standards.
7. The BCC hasn't yet stood the test of time. Thus far, the Board Certified Coach credential is not widely recognized, nor is it the the gold standard in coaching. For the time being, I would recommend the BCC only as a provisional certification, on the level of the ICF's ACC (Associate Credentialed Coach), that a new coach might want, while they work toward a more recognized coach certification.

What do you think? Share your comments and concerns about the new Board Certified Coach credential in the comments area below.

One Million Master Coaches Worldwide? It has a nice ring, doesn't it?

 

But what does One Million Master Coaches mean? Better said, what WILL it mean when there are one million master coaches in the world? That's my question and it IS a question...

I'm hoping to pique your imagination and find out what you think one million master coaches will mean when it becomes a fact and not just a fantasy. Here's why...

The growth of professional life and business coaching has been so strong over the past 20 years, that it's really a matter of time, probably a few decades, before we reach one million coaches around the world.

But business and life coaching aren't just growing in numbers, the skill level of coaches is also skyrocketing. What was considered master coaching a decade ago is not outstanding any longer.

So by current standards, not only will we have a million coaches worldwide someday, but we will have a million master coaches worldwide. What difference will that make to the world, to coaching clients and to coaches, themselves?

One Million Master Coaches Worldwide...

• will mean one coach for every 7,000 people on the planet
  
• will mean coaching will saturate currently underserved areas, like South America and Africa
• will mean the economics of coaching will change - but how?
  
• will mean people everywhere will have access to personal empowerment, growth, achievement and fulfillment
• will mean billions of people will operate far more effectively in their lives and businesses
• will mean people will think at a level that can (easily?) solve many of today's most vexing problems
• will mean a global transformation that is (almost) unimaginable
• will be a game-changer for sure

 

What else will one million master coaches mean...to you? to the coaching industry? to the world? Add your comments below... No idea about one million master coaches worldwide could possibly be too wild...

Want to know what kind of salary a life coach makes?

I wrote about international coaching salaries in the 2012 Trends in Business and Life Coaching post, based on the new ICF coach survey, which sheds light on the parts of the world where coaches earn the most. But a Sherpa Executive Coaching Survey of international coach salaries just came out, so here's some new info, broken down by type of coach.

It's important to note that executive, life and business coaching incomes vary wildly, (anywhere from free to thousands of dollars per hour) so these averages may not represent what most coaches actually make. However they do offer some clues.

Average coaching salaries according to Sherpa:

• Executive Coaches make $325 per hour
• Business Coaches make $235 per hour
• Life Coaches make $160 per hour

What's the difference between a life coach, a business coach and an executive coach? Sherpa's definition of an executive coach is someone who coaches executives on behavioral issues, which basically means an executive coach is a life coach for executives.

I take issue with Sherpa's definition that business and life coaches are consultants and advisors. Real coaches are neither consultants, nor advisers. Real coaches help their clients think and act more resourcefully, resulting in personal growth and achievement and for that reason, coaches usually make a lot more money than consultants or advisers.

In my experience, new business and life coaches can charge $100 - 200 per hour and veteran coaches with established results can often charge $250 - 600 per hour. What makes the difference is the skill of the coach and who they coach.

It's pretty extraordinary that someone who coaches by phone in their jammies from their home office could charge more than a Park Avenue lawyer, but it happens - if their clients get incredible results and can afford to pay for them.

Here's how: most successful coaches only have a few clients. According to Sherpa,  coaches average between 6 and 6.5 clients per week. When you only coach a few clients, you can be at your best virtually all of the time, which makes it possible to give incredible service and results. That's when you can charge a lot.

So average annual incomes, according to Sherpa, range from $55K to $116K. That's pretty close to past ICF survey averages for a life coach (or business or executive coach) salary.

Learn more about life coach salary rates and how to set your own coaching fees:

 

Once upon a time, in a land far far away, where everything always looked as it should, if you hired a life coach, s/he was most likely older than you. Prevailing wisdom said more experience meant greater wisdom and that's what you want in your life coach, right? Maybe.

In the world I live in, life coaches come in all ages and aren't necessarily all sages. Does that even matter?

At left, is Life Coach, Traci McMinn-Joubert, CCC. She's one of the many under-forty coaches who studies at School of Coaching Mastery and who hold their own with most of us older coaches. Apparently, that's surprising to a lot of people, including some coaches.

For instance, yesterday, the New York Times ran an article called, Should a Life Coach Have a Life First? about the growing trend toward younger coaches in this profession. I found the online comments on this article more interesting than the article, itself. They're loaded with misconceptions and skepticism from folks who aren't sure what life coaching is but suspect they don't like it, plus the occasional plug by an actual life coach that tends to seem self-serving. So I thought I would try to help clear up the confusion. Here goes...

1. One reason younger coaches do well is that life experience is only a fraction of what life coaches offer. As I tell my students, advice is the least of the deliverables you have to offer your clients. Coaching is far more than that. Author, David Rock, says life coaches help people think better. That might not sound like much, but if you need to make life-changing decisions, having someone help you think better is priceless. And that pretty much explains  why coaches command such high fees when everyone knows that advice is free.

2. Another reason is that experience is relative. Clients hire life coaches who are on a similar path, but further along. If you just graduated from college, for instance, and want a coach who can help you make that enormous transition from student to full-fledged adult in today's world (that's a big need), it makes sense to hire a coach who's a few years older than you, rather than someone your grandma's age.

3. A third reason younger coaches do well is that experience has a short shelf life in today's world. Maybe you have awesome experience on how to climb the corporate ladder from the 1960's through the 1990's, but you struggle with social media, smart phones, apps and tablets. If so, then you may not understand the culture, much less have the skills needed by today's workers, who are intra-preneurial and know that there's no gold watch, nor life-long pension waiting for them.

Let's face it, young coaching clients are an ever-renewing potential source of business for life coaches and some of them want young coaches who they can relate to.

Then again, Baby Boomers are still asking themselves questions like, "What do I want to be when my children grow up?" And in some cases, older coaches are the ones who can help middles-aged clients make better choices that lead to happier lives (another big need).

The real issue isn't how old your life coach is, but how much 1) personal development, and 2) coaching skill, they have under their belts. Too little personal development and their egos and issues will get in the client's way. Too little coaching skill and their clients' thinking and behavior won't be impacted enough to make a difference in their lives.

Rather than choose your coach based on age, I'd suggest you ask the following two questions:

1. Did someone you know and trust highly recommend a life coach who helped them achieve something that you want? Don't hire a coach just because his/her age is appropriate or marketing is convincing. Look for outside evidence of results.

2. Does your life coach have substantial coach-specific training (not just a related degree) and/or a certification from the IAPPC, IAC or ICF? Unless your coach has been at it for 20+ years, they need to be well trained and certified.

A good coach doesn't have to have both of the above, but they probably have at least one.

Here's my last thought on age and coaching, for whatever it's worth. In my twenties, I personally, would have made a lousy coach. I was too immature and had too many issues to work out. Not everyone improves with age, but I suspect that, like me, many coaches do.

What do you think? Should your life coach be older or younger?

If you want to become a certified coach and you're ready to get started, consider the Certified Positive Psychology Coach Program which leads to IAPPC certification. Our students range in age from their twenties to their seventies.

Find out all about it here:

 

I finally have an answer for you to the age-old question: Which is more effective, coaching by telephone or coaching in person?

The coaches who prefer coaching in person, invariably assume their way is better. Those of us who prefer to coach by telephone sheepishly counter that coaching by phone seems to work just as well.

But is telephone coaching really just as good as coaching face-to-face?

After all, we've all read the scientific estimates that up to 90% of the information we receive in a face-to-face conversation is visual, not verbal. So how can telephone coaching possibly work as well as face-to-face coaching?

And from another perspective, face-to-face coaches often brag that they make more money per hour, but do they really? Yes, telephone coaches charge their clients on average slightly less per contact hour, but they also spend less time in non-contact hours.

I'll explain: While I don't recommend scheduling your clients back-to-back (a 15 minute break helps you refocus), I've done it and I know lots of other phone coaches who do it and I can tell you that a few hours, earning $300/hour, from my home office on a snowy Monday sure beats traffic jams, commuter trains, crowded elevators and cafeteria lunches, ad nauseum, by a mile. And when you add up the extra time spent in transit, plus tolls, tickets, parking, gas, wardrobe, wear and tear on your car, eating out, not to mention all of the above which also has to be spent on in-person client attraction, versus attracting clients via the internet, I'm willing to bet telephone coaches make more per hour, keep more of it for themselves,  and enjoy more of their working hours with less stress. A coach who's relaxed and having fun is always better than one who is not.

But here's why telephone coaching is actually more effective than face-to-face coaching:

Remember how up to 90% of information taken in during a face-to-face conversation is visual? That should make face-to-face coaching 10 times more effective than telephone coaching, but it doesn't. Why? Because nearly all of that visual information is unconscious, meaning the coach isn't even aware of it.

It gets worse. Many assume that our brains absorb continuous information, like video cameras  making a movie, but they don't. Not even close. Your brain takes a couple of snapshots of visual information and fills in (nearly all) the rest with your expectations, assumptions, beliefs, shadows, biases and prejudices. In short, while you're talking to that person, you're taking in some new information from them, but you're unconsciously adding 80-90 times as much information from your past.

And you don't even know it.

With telephone coaching, if you're well-trained, you learn to consciously hear more. And if you practice those hearing skills in hundreds of coaching sessions, you develop the kind of hearing - at least for conversations - that usually only the blind possess because thousands of hours of coaching changes your brain. That means you can hear far more than most of us ever thought possible. And you do it without adding tons of info from your past.

Are telephone coaches completely free of their past assumptions? No, of course not; no one is. But a strong case can be made that, because telephone coaching is a skill that's consciously learned from the ground up, the coach is aware of a larger percentage of incoming information, which helps them interface more fully with the present and the uniqueness of their client and the client's situation.

Here's an example: I've lost track over the years of the number of clients I've coached who were of a different race, socio-economic background, or sexual orientation, and I didn't know it. I'd like to think that wouldn't make any difference (unless it was pertinent to the topic of the coaching), but I've seen the studies on that and know how unlikely it is that anyone is completely free of biases.

Telephone coaching doesn't eliminate all assumptions and biases, but it narrows them down and makes it less likely that a bias or shadow can lurk undiscovered.

Here's another reason coaching by phone is more powerful: When using the telephone (or Skype), you can coach with anyone in the world. That means that out of over 7 billion people worldwide, you can match up with your ideal clients and be their perfect coach. Coaching in person is almost always constrained by distance and travel, forcing people to coach with whomever they can find in their home city.

You'd think with the ease and low cost of talking via online video, that video coaching would catch on quickly, but it hasn't so far. I'm guessing it's because video tends to highlight the visual in a way that makes it even harder to listen and really hear - and raises the likelihood that unconscious visual information is triggering a conditioned response. And if people can see their own image, they are more self conscious and less likely to show up authentically. Some find video coaching more distracting than anything. Indeed, some find talking by telephone t o have an intimacy that's lost with video.

Last but not least, from the client's perspective, lower prices for telephone coaching, plus higher quality coaching, means a greater ROI (return on investment) for clients. Who doesn't like that?

In short: phone coaching is not only just as good as in-person coaching, it's actually better. Do you agree?

We've been training our coaches via distance learning and preparing them for international coaching careers for over a decade. Find out more below:

The Sherpa Executive Coaching Summary, a large-scale annual survey on the state of executive, life and business coaching, was just released yesterday, with a startling statistic that 10% of all coaching schools worldwide go out of business every year - every year.

I've heard this statistic tossed about in reference to specific years, but now it's becoming an annual trend? This flies in the face of an old coaching myth, that the real money is in coach training, not coaching. That couldn't be further from the truth.

Why are coaching schools going out of business when the profession of coaching is still growing?

1. One theory is that there are too many coaching schools. As Donna Steinhorn mentioned in her recent The Truth About Coach Training post, 10-12 years ago, there were only a few coach training schools, but now there are well over 100 coaching schools, worldwide. Sherpa says there are actually over 300 coach training schools in the world. In fact, peer.ca, which tries to compile all the coach training schools worldwide, lists 508, as of today.

That means around 50 coaching schools will go out of business this year. Will one of them be yours?

2. Another theory is that many professional coaches, believing the myth that 'the real money is in coach training', started coaching schools when their businesses were challenged recently during Depression 2.0. If that's the case, I'm guessing most of them have/will go out of business, because it is actually much more expensive and time-consuming to run a quality coach training business than it is to run a coaching business.

Personally, I made more money per hour as 'just a coach' than I do running School of Coaching Mastery. Education, done well, is labor-intensive and labor is expensive.

Why do I do it? SCM is a labor of love for me. I have a vision of one million master coaches worldwide and I'm just getting started.

3. Another theory of why 10% of coach training schools go out of business, is that coach training has become a commodity. There is so much competition that schools are competing on price, rather that value. This was further supported by the incredibly high unemployment rates of the past few years, when people were desperately trying to start coaching businesses with little or no money.

When money is extremely tight, unlikely promises, such as the promise of one coaching school mentioned by Sherpa, that you can 'Become a Certified Professional Life Coach in Just 16 Hours' for $397 or $497, or whatever the price du jour is, become alluringly tempting. If such a school also brags about their 3000 successful graduates, you have to wonder about their criteria for 'success'. I've talked to quite a few 'graduates' of these 2-week wonders (because eventually they realize they need more training and contact me) and not one of them has told me they ever got a single paying client.

So in the race to the bottom, some schools, even the huge schools that were founded in the mid-nineties, have become less profitable. And if you're not in it for love, you'll get out if there's not much profit.

School of Coaching Mastery is about to turn five years old in March. We've weathered Depression 2.0 and our international Ultimate Coach Training coach-students are spreading their masterful coaching skills to thousands of grateful (paying) clients. 

I wouldn't close this coaching school for anything. I've got too much work to do to get those one million master coaches out there changing the world for the better.

What do you think? Do 10% of all coach training schools really go out of business each year? Why or why not? I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments section, below.

A month ago, I posted to this blog with questions about conversations that coaches dread and I mentioned that best-selling author, Deborah Brown-Volkman, and I are working on a related project...

Well, I'm ready to tell you about the 1st step in the related project: It's a series of 4 interactive webinars, hosted by Deborah and me on 4 types of conversations that coaches tend to dread and how to handle them.

You see, Deborah and I are both constantly asked by stressed-out coaches who are unprepared for tricky communication issues that come up all the time and we knew somebody needed to address this stuff, like...

• Clients who lie or don't follow through on fieldwork
• Potential clients who say they 'can't afford' you
• Clients who don't pay on time
• How to fix it when you've said the wrong thing

These issues aren't just embarrassing and stressful; the fear and confusion that come from not knowing what to say or how to handle tough situations like these can bring your success to a screeching halt!

So here's what we're doing to help: In these 4 one-hour Q&A webinars, Deborah and I will offer advice on how to handle the most-oft asked questions, but we won't stop there: You can ask your biggest questions and we'll answer on the spot.

Think of it as an injection of clarity that brings you the ease and confidence you want for yourself and your business - and we're doing it at a price that any savvy coach can handle:

Take one class or all four and get the answers you need on 4 Mondays, January 23rd to February 13th, 2-3 PM EST (GMT-5). They're just $30 per class...but if you act quickly you can save up to $40!

• How to Have Have Tough Conversations With Potential Coaching Clients

• How to Deal With Renegade Coaching Clients

• How to Create Ideal Coaching Clients With Advanced Communication Skills

• How to Have Conversations That Create Your Ideal Coaching Business
  

Here's a secret to all of these questions: The are all best handled proactively. But how can you set up yourself for success if you don't know what to expect? Easy. Ask your questions and listen to the questions and answers that other coaches share on these value-packed calls. Deborah and I know a lot and we're ready to share!

Seating is limited and classes are filling up. But if you act fast (a.k.a. proactively), you can save $10 on each class that you sign up for. How?

Register by January 20th and get each class for $20: Add the discount code below when you register online. Click 'Apply' and the cost of each class will be lowered to just $20. But you must use the discount code no later than 5 PM EST this Friday, January 20th.

Discount Code: Early20

Click below to register now:

 

My colleague and friend, Deborah Brown-Volkman, and I are planning a coaching communications project that moves beyond, ‘Which coaching questions should I ask?’ and covers the trickiest and stickiest conversations that professional coaches must have, but often dread.

 

 

You know the coaching conversations that give you sweaty palms:

• How do you handle the client who doesn’t pay you on time?
• How do you tell your client that you really can’t give them an extra 20-30 minutes every week?
• How do you tell your client that s/he needs therapy instead of coaching?
• What do you say to the client who ‘can’t afford’ you?
• How do you raise your fees without losing your clients?
• [insert your dreaded client conversation question here]

My students and mentees ask me these questions everyday, but Deborah and I are creating a new resource to give you answers and ideas that are right at your fingertips.

The truth is, as a coach, you need advanced communication skills. And if you don’t have them, your peace of mind will suffer and so will your coaching.

“Success in life is directly proportional to the number of awkward conversations you’re willing to have.” - Anonymous

Do you worry about how to handle touchy conversations with your coaching clients? Then please share which conversations keep you up at night in our comments section, below.

Tell us some of the hardest or most difficult conversations you've had or don't want to have. Your questions about communication best practices for coaches will help shape this project greatly - and will help us to better help you.

Please share your questions below. We’ll be happy to offer answers or methods for finding your own best answers, so you never have to dread having another uncomfortable conversation again. And if you have a great story about how you handled a tough conversation, we’d love to hear it - and you might just help a fellow coach get a good night’s sleep tonight!

[UPDATE: Deborah and I are hosting 4 low-cost live, interactive tele-webinars on how to have the toughest coaching conversations of your career. Click below for more info...]

Ask your questions about dreaded coaching conversations, below...

You've probably heard that group coaching is a must-have for your coaching business, but you may never have thought about becoming a Certified Group Coach.

In my opinion, you don't have to offer group coaching, but if you're ready to branch out from just one-to-one coaching clients, group coaching is the next logical place to go. Yes, information products are great, but dollar for dollar and hour for hour, you'll make more from group coaching, especially if you don't already have a mailing list of thousands.

There are probably hundreds of good reasons to add group coaching to your business, but I've highlighted ten from my own experience below, just to give you an idea.

Group coaching is an advanced skill set, combining many of the skills of one-to-one coaching with group facilitation and more. I thought it would be easy for me, because I was a very good one-to-one coach with 15 years of experience as a college professor. In the beginning, it was a lot harder than I thought! But if you think group coaching is something you want to learn more about and if you'd like to become a Certified Group Coach, skip to the bottom of this blog post and check out an upcoming opportunity.

Top Ten Reasons to Become a Certified Group Coach:

1. Make more money

In 2003, my first coaching groups were focused on a hot new certification from the IAC, which used Thomas Leonard's Proficiencies. I was teaching the Proficiencies at the time, so offering a mentor group to help coaches master them, was a natural for me. I filled my first group up with 10 people and had to open a second one quickly, because even more people wanted to join. It kicked up my income very nicely, even though the groups themselves were a bargain to join.

2. Charge less to your clients

As I said, I charged bargain fees to my clients for those first groups, only $75 per month, per person. But with 20 new clients, that was $1,500 more income per month and about $250 per contact hour. Nice pay ~ and very affordable for my clients! Actually, you can charge much more for group coaching, depending on your market. Generally, groups meet for three to six hours per month, with group sizes ranging from 3 to 10 clients. And most coaching groups cost $150 to $350 per month, per person. Do the math. Group coaching saves money for the client and makes more money for you.

3. Grow your fan base faster

I mentioned your email marketing list earlier, because your True Fans are a vitally important element in your coaching success. Building that list with just one-to-one clients can be murder. Coaching groups with 3 to 10 members each, will help you build that list 3 to 10 times faster.

It's an incredible amount of work to design ebooks, white papers and other information products to attract new people to your list, but coaching is customized in the moment, so there is far less upfront work, while far more value is delivered - and at a higher price that clients gladly pay. People simply view in-person, customized service as more valuable than pre-designed, canned content - because it's far more effective.

Contrary to what you may have heard, coaching clients don't need to buy cheap products from you before they hire you to be their coach. For most of them, you being a credible coach who is in the right place at the right time, with an appealing specialty or niche, is all it takes.

4. Give more value to your clients

Here's where it gets interesting: your group clients will actually get a lot more value from each other than they would from you alone, so a group of ten will multiply value by ten. Why? Groups are organized around commonalities between the members of the group and their mutual goals. So guess what? They have experiences, know-how and resources that you don't have and they tend to share them generously - so long as you know how to set up a bonded  synchronous group, which is one of those advanced skill sets I mentioned.

5. Upsell to one-to-one coaching

It's natural to balance group coaching with one-to-one coaching, because sometimes your clients need you to drill down deeper with an issue than you have time for during the group meeting. This is an important value add for your clients, which gives them the benefits of one-to-one coaching plus group coaching. You can easily add an option for each group member to have one or two individual coaching sessions per month with you and of course, you can charge extra for that.

6. Increase your credibility

As you become known for certain specialties or niches in your coaching groups, you'll become known for those specialties and niches in all your coaching. Once I offered the Get Certified Coaching Groups, which I mentioned above, I became known as a mentor coach who helps coaches get certified. This became an important part of my one-to-one coaching practice for several years, as well - until I leveraged my reputation and what I had learned to start School of Coaching Mastery. You see, over the years, I became an expert on this type of coaching and potential clients saw me as someone they wanted to work with on this. In other words, I developed the credibility to do well with this niche and specialty.

Back then, there was very little training in group coaching, so I had to teach myself and it took years of trial and error. There were no group coaching certifications, but if there had been, I'd have gotten one. Credibility is everything when you're in business for yourself.

7. Decrease your work hours

You can work day and night on a membership site, on information products and live events - or you can just coach. Group coaching pays you even more per hour than one-to-one coaching, so if a short work week is a goal for you, then group coaching needs to be a specialty of yours.

8. Add additional income streams

As you organize your coaching groups, you'll find yourself writing more, because it'll be an easy way to communicate with groups. The nice thing about that is that once you've written something, it can be re-purposed.

Remember how I mentioned that it's a lot of work creating information products? If you've already created something for a high-paying coaching group, you've been well-paid for your time. If you take that written piece and sell it as a free-standing product at a lower price, whatever you make from it will be profit. That's the easier, more profitable way to do it.

Also, working with groups of people will give you a good idea what kinds of solutions they're looking for. That may spark great ideas when you're ready to do live events or create products.

9. Upsell from information products

Remember how I said that clients don't have to try inexpensive products from you in order to be willing to hire you to coach them? Well that's true. And sometimes you'll attract people who were just looking for that inexpensive ebook that tells them how to do something, but upon reading it they'll realize what they really want is a coach. If you have both group coaching and one-to-one coaching options, you'll be able to reach more people in exactly the format they want.

10. Learn where your next opportunities are

Just as I mentioned in #8 above, working intensively with clients will give you ideas about what they really want and need next - even when they, themselves, can't tell you what that is. So group coaching is perhaps the most valuable form of R&D possible, because you get to know your coaching clients inside and out. For me, that took me from coach, to mentor coach, to founding my own coaching school. I knew what my clients wanted and needed because I had gotten to know them so well.

Where will group coaching take you and your business? Where ever it is, you'll get there much faster if you don't have to learn it all from the ground up. That's why we're offering the 8-hour Master Group Coaching Success module, which ends with a Group Coaching Certificate. You'll learn how to organize, market and facilitate successful coaching groups in these live tele-webinars, which come with written materials and more.

Want to become a Certified Group Coach? Take Master Group Coaching Success, described above, and then join the upcoming Certified Group Coach Mentor Group. I'll personally mentor you as you learn to lead your own groups and get started with your very first group. You must attend both the learning module and the mentor group in order to become a Certified Group Coach.

 

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